


This is your love story in black and white

by mostlikelydefinentlymad



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Developing Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, Sherlock Holmes and Feelings, from an outsiders POV, hat tip to Jolto, the story of their love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-17
Updated: 2015-08-17
Packaged: 2018-04-15 07:09:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4597488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mostlikelydefinentlymad/pseuds/mostlikelydefinentlymad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You will be preoccupied when he limps into your life - you will do your very best to keep a calm and collected demeanor. You will ask him to move in with you - when he rejects the notion you will dazzle him and leave him with his mouth hanging open. You will wink at him and your heart will pound painfully hard in your chest - you will silently thank the heavens and Mike Stamford too. He will accept.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This is your love story in black and white

**SHERLOCK**

You will be preoccupied when he limps into your life - you will do your very best to keep a calm and collected demeanor. You will ask him to move in with you - when he rejects the notion you will dazzle him and leave him with his mouth hanging open. You will wink at him and your heart will pound painfully hard in your chest - you will silently thank the heavens and Mike Stamford too. He will accept.

**JOHN**

The first time you see him the gray fog of merely surviving will wash away - he will make you want to live again before you even know his name. He is magnetic and you are drawn to him - you didn't stand a chance. 

**SHERLOCK**

He will make a comment about the messy flat and you will scurry around relocating papers and stabbing one in particular onto the fireplace mantle. He will not flinch. You heart will decide that he is the one.

**JOHN**

You will wonder if he is a madman and what you got yourself into as the two of you run at full speed on the streets of London. Shades of lavender and violet at your backs - a physical manifestation of love in bloom. You will try to remember the last time you had this feeling - it will bring painful memories of a certain major. You will tamp them down and try to forget.

**SHERLOCK**

You will show him your dark side and project every flaw - he will leave. Everyone does. He stays. His eyes light up as he sprinkles compliments all around you - you will wonder how you ever got so lucky. 

**JOHN**

Something will happen - you will feel it before it does. He is in danger and you will find him. You will frantically run up flights of stairs and weave in and out of rooms - you will not find him there. His shadow in the other building will make your stomach sink - death is looming around the corner. You do not hesitate to shoot to kill. He will know and he will cover your tracks - an accessory to murder. He is everything.

**SHERLOCK**

He will kill for you - you decide that bullets _can_ be love letters and he has just written you a sonnet in someone else' blood. You should not find it endearing but you do. You hope he reads between the lines when you ask him to go to dinner with you - food is not a priority but he is.

**JOHN**

The second time you decide to kill for him will be when a much taller man wraps large hands around that pale neck and all at once you spring at him. You will not kill that man. Later you will be kidnapped and a bomb strapped to your chest for him - his eyes will soften with betrayal when you speak the words that the voice inside of your ear hisses. The man will be familiar - he will mock the two of you and train sniper rifles on you. You will die for him - you have decided. You will be spared by a phone call. You will realize how deeply engrained he is in your heart already. It is dangerous.

**SHERLOCK**

He will stumble in wrapped in a thick Winter jacket and semtex - he is someone else' weapon. You will falter and for a moment, entertain the idea of him being Jim Moriarty. You will push the thought out of your head and focus on saving him. He will put the man in a headlock and order you to run - to leave. It will be the strongest 'I love you' that you have ever experienced. You will decide to die with him - you are with him until death.

**JOHN**

You will leave for two weeks with your current girlfriend and try to make sense of what happened. Fact: You will die for him, Fact: He will die for you, Fact: You want him in ways that you should not want a flatmate or even a friend. You will force a smile and follow her around New Zealand - she will know. She will leave you. Somehow you saw this coming. 

**SHERLOCK**

His absence will be a heavy cloak upon the flat and all of the shadows. You will bite your own fingers to keep from calling him and begging him to come back because without him you are bored but mostly lonely. Instead you will purchase his favorite beer and stock the fridge. He will return alone and you will thank your lucky stars.

**JOHN**

You will take your place beside of him on a couch that costs more than you've ever made. He will sit there in nothing but a sheet and you will feel your skin heating - you will not hide your interest as you peek - eyes darting to a certain sensitive area. He will not meet your eyes - he will feel them on him. When he does you will burst out laughing because the situation is utterly ridiculous and the air is tense. They will hand him a picture of one of the most beautiful women you've ever saw and you will gape at it. You will meet her soon and your stomach will lurch with jealousy. You were here first. 

**SHERLOCK**

She will show up completely nude - you will not be able to read her and you will feel outnumbered.  He will come into the room armed with a bowl of warm water and a cloth - you will wonder what his hands would have felt like on your skin. You crave it. You will deduce him and linger on parted pink lips - she will insinuate that he feels exposed. She will make a comment about him knowing where to look - you will feel sick. You will not show it.

**JOHN**

They will tell the two of you that she is dead. You will wonder if he even experiences feelings - grief. He will play sad music on his violin and you will realize you never had his heart in the first place. You will drink heavily - the hard stuff. You will numb yourself.

She will meet you later - flesh and blood despite the odds. You will rage at her for hurting him and force her hand - TELL HIM. She will read you like a book - you're in love with Sherlock Holmes. You will throw a half lie her way - _I'm not actually gay._ You are not gay - you are bisexual. Your mind flickers to desert sand and the taste of dirt on James' lips against your own. You will not tell her.

**SHERLOCK**

She is dead. You will mourn as she was the only person who had ever matched you wit for wit. He will misunderstand - you will not correct him as he will go out and choose your favorite wine. You want to right that wrong and show him how much he matters. It will come to a screeching halt when he finds her in your bed. She will stay - he will go. You will dive into your mind palace and block out the rest of the world - he will be there and you will speak to him out loud as if he'd never left the room. She will know.

**JOHN**

He will dance around the flat with hips thrusting in his chair - you will have to focus on your newspaper 'lest your eyes give everything away. He will crave tobacco - you will crave him. A client will show up and his eyes will dart from you to him and you will wonder how you got to be so translucent. You will toss him a pack of cigarettes - there is nothing wrong with bowing to temptation. This is what you tell yourself as you collect a room key and the inn keeper asks if he snores. You wish you had the answer to that question.

Later, in sheer terror you will call his phone - you will not contemplate for one minute calling anyone else in what could be your last minutes of life. He will rescue you with a firm hand to your shoulder. Your entire body will shake with fear and rage. You will spew it at him.

**SHERLOCK**

Your body will spring to life anytime he is around - you will hunger for everything he is. Instead of taking what you want you will blame the need for tobacco. You have been that route before - it is not a suitable replacement. You will follow him to Baskerville and trade snarky remarks. You will share a room with two beds and watch him as he rests - you will not sleep a wink. The following night you will be frightened for the first time since you were a child - you will take it out on him. He will leave. You will send him a picture of an attractive female therapist and tell yourself that if this is what he wants then you can and will fall back. It will cut deeper than any knife could have. Despite it all you feel like you're making progress - it's in the way he looks at you.

**JOHN**

This is where you will lose him. Hours before he glides to earth like a fallen angel, your hand will be firmly gripping his - you are fugitives. You have no regrets. You do not believe a single word against him. You hope he knows this. He will teeter on the edge of a hospital building and you will hear the tears in his voice as he lies. You will struggle to talk him down - it will not work. Your knees will buckle under the weight of it all as strangers pull you back - blood. So much blood in his beautiful hair and beloved coat - spilling onto the pavement like puddles of rain. You will decide that red is an awful color - it will haunt you for two years but you do not know this yet. You will return to an empty flat and stare at his chair - if you want it hard enough maybe it will come undone - every last bit of it. It does not work. You will move out and take up drinking - you will hide this.

**SHERLOCK**

You will stand on the rooftop with John's future in the palm of your hands and your heart in your throat - you must die so that he may live. You wish it could be different - you plan an escape route and hope that it goes off without a hitch. It does. As you lie on the cold pavement with eyes fixed on the sky you scream on the inside - rip down solid walls inside of your mind palace and plaster his face in every corner. You did not die but it will feel like death. You will stay gone for two years - you will solve small crimes and hear his voice in your head, you will be captured and beaten, starved and tortured to the nth degree.  You will decide that this is how it ends - it will not. Mycroft will save you - he always has. You will put on your finest clothing and even get a close shave. You will want to look nice for him - irresistible. You will show up at a crowded restaurant with soft lighting and wonder what he is doing here. You tell yourself that if anything he is meeting a date and they never last. You will reveal yourself at last and the look in his eye will make you tear up.

**JOHN**

You will mourn him every single day for two years - you will take her to his grave and hope that she meets his approval. You will feel like an idiot - waiting for a dead man's thumbs up. She will listen as you weave together stories and cases - you will break down more than once and she will hold you. You will decide that she is worth keeping around - you will make her your wife.

The world ceases spinning when you see him looking for all the world to be real and living - you will wonder if you're seeing things. You have been down this road before - it ends with the bottom of a liquor bottle. She confirms - he is actually there. You throw him to the floor with a passion that you had contained for two years - it all rushes to the surface as you put your hands around his neck - not tight enough to hurt. You register his thumb brushing against the back of your hand and just like that it's two years earlier and he's gripping your hand tight as you run from the law. You force yourself to focus as the restaurant is silent - everyone is watching your destruction. The thought of proposing is the last thing on your mind as you follow him from one place to the next.

**SHERLOCK**

Fact: she is special, Fact: you came back too late, Fact: it is no longer just the two of you against the rest of the world, Fact: you are losing him.

You will spend the next few weeks holed up in your flat with your nose in a case. Mrs. Hudson will see right through you - she always has. You will tell her that John wants nothing to do with you - the words will make you ache. You will replace him with Molly. You will roll the dice and go for it but she is not him and she will not settle for being second best.

He will surprise you by popping by when your parents are visiting (everyone will know how hard you are taking this) and you will comment on his lack of facial hair - he did this for you. It settles warm in your belly like hot tea on a cold night. Part of him still belongs to you - he has everything when it comes to you. All of the shattered fragments.

**JOHN**

Once more you will stand at deaths door and knock. You will greet it with him at your side as it should be - you had a chance to leave but you did not. You will not survive losing him again. You bite back the words _I love you so fucking much you idiot, why can't you see it? And now it's too late - why did you do this to us?_ and instead tell him that he is the best and wisest man - you have made this speech before. You hope that he reads between the lines. His eyes will fill with tears and you will turn away and squeeze yours tightly closed - you want to comfort him. Instead you ball your hands into fists at your side.

**SHERLOCK**

You are going to die and take him down with you. This was not the reunion you had planned - everything has taken a wrong turn. You will tell him to save himself - he will not. You want to scream at him at the top of your lungs - all the things you should have said two years ago. He will forgive you - it will feel like salvation. At the last minute you will stop death in its tracks and it will be so utterly ridiculous that you will laugh and he will follow suit. It will feels as if nothing has changed.

**JOHN**

You are getting married, he will be your best man. The best man in the entire room for that matter. You feel like a stranger in the flat you once shared together as he drinks tea with an eyeball floating inside. You will tell him in a round about way that you love him - he will struggle to process this and instead focus on 'best friend'. You will scold yourself for being a piss poor excuse of a best friend - if he couldn't see it then you were not doing a good job. He will accept and spend endless hours and weeks throwing himself into planning - in a moment of weakness you will pretend that it is your wedding and his that is being planned - you imagine how nitpicky he will be with colors ('Lilac, John!') and seating arrangements. Your chest will ache - you will drag him out of the flat and onto a case instead. It will feel like time is working against you.

**SHERLOCK**

Married. You will lose him. You will not be ready to surrender just yet - you will ensure that his special day is everything he ever wanted complete with an unexpected murder (though you couldn't have planned that) because this is John and it's terribly fitting. You will watch as he grins widely at a man in uniform  - you will recognize that look. It is the same one he gives you. She will taunt that John talks about him all the time - you will want to dash from the room and hurl. Instead you will straighten your back and nod.

At the reception John will gaze at you with open adoration in the face of his new bride as you break the news - Mary is pregnant. He will act as if she were a vessel and that child would belong to the two of you. All too soon he'll crash back to earth with panic in his eyes - he is not ready for this. You wonder if you ever will be. They dance - there is no room for you in his life. You leave early - change your clothes and do something reckless. It does not matter.

**JOHN**

You will search the crowd for his face and you will not find it. You will spend your honeymoon checking on him and talking to him via your blog. You will not miss the spite in his words when he tells your readers that you're on a 'sex holiday'. You will miss him like a phantom limb. A month will pass - you will give him his space. He will find you - you are sure of it. 

**SHERLOCK**

It's a clever trap - John's neighbor will meet you at the drug den and his mother will be concerned - it is not the first time he has hidden there. John will come for him and his face will pale and then flush with anger. She will be there - of course. She will make a snide comment in regards to taking Billy along. You will see her for how she really is. John will not. Molly will slap you three times and it will sting - it will make you feel alive. Mycroft will send in his minions to confiscate the flat - it is too much and John is there. You will hide your face in embarrassment and anger and curl up into a ball in your chair - if you're just small enough you might disappear and wouldn't that be nice? He notices that his chair is missing - in a flurry of grief you had pushed it into your bedroom and firmly closed the door behind it. You had not been able to sleep in the room since. You tell him it was blocking your view to the kitchen. You're too raw and exposed at the moment and it is impossible to hide your feelings.

**JOHN**

You will want to kill him personally when you find him with drugs in his body and looking worse for the wear. He will look like a broken man - you will blame yourself. You will call up his brother for backup because he hasn't even been back a year yet and already he is slipping away. You can't do this again. Your chair will be gone - a physical reminder that your place in his heart and flat no longer exists. Janine will emerge from his bedroom as he showers and you will know that your face is revealing every thought but you do not care. You're somewhere in between fury and sobbing. She will know her way around the flat and wear his shirt - you will feel a pang of jealousy and possessiveness. She does not love him like you do. He will kiss her right in front of you and you will turn away with disgust - you come to the conclusion that he must have felt the same when he watched you kiss the bride and vow to spend the rest of your life with her - even as your eyes were glued to his.

All too soon you will follow along and he will explain that he abused her connection - you will wonder if he is even human.

**SHERLOCK**

You will trick him and savor the jealousy that plays across his face - he does care. You will drag him along on a case - you need him. You always have. It will go terribly wrong - Mary will be behind the trigger. Your body will fall to the floor with an ungraceful thump and you will know - this is goodbye. Moriarty is in your mind palace and he is rubbing salt in the wound. It is this that brings you back to the fight. You crawl and climb your way back from the dead - for him. You will come to with her name on your lips and nothing more. He will read too much into it. 

**JOHN**

He is bleeding and his pulse is fading and all at once you're back on that street with a limp wrist in your hand as you breathlessly murmur "He's my friend...Jesus....Sherlock...." You do your best not to panic - that is not what he needs. The ambulance arrives and he spends months in the hospital - you leave him long enough to welcome visitors. You have flowers delivered and scowl at the red rose - it is from the woman and it puts your bouquet to shame. The room will be empty as Greg follows you to it. Sherlock will call you with a rasping voice and tell you to meet him at Lannister Gardens - you will bite back the urge to call him all the names in the book and tell him hes being a ridiculous dickhead. You will nearly collapse when he tells you the truth - Mary shot him. He will force you to remain calm and devise a plan.

**SHERLOCK**

You will confront her and pride yourself on doing a stellar job and having only the best of connections in all the right places. Her face will be plastered onto the building and she will reveal all of her cards as John comes out of the shadows. You will follow him ~~home~~ to the flat and defend her to the death - and it very nearly is. You will do this for John - she is carrying his child and she is dangerous. You will not test her.

**JOHN**

You will growl and your eyes will turn stormy and cold as you remind him 'She SHOT you'. He will continue to make excuses - you will wonder what he is planning. You will kick a side table hard enough to send it flying and it will feel like redemption. She will sit in the clients chair, Sherlock will sit in his own and you in yours - a powerful dynamic that speaks for itself: 'HE came before you. WE are making this decision together.' You will nearly lose him again - you will all but carry him to the ambulance yourself as you repeat "Sherlock...Sherlock we're losing you." It is a desperate plea - stay with me.

**SHERLOCK**

Months will pass after the confrontation and her belly will swell - your stomach will roll every time you look at it - a constant reminder of John's love for someone who isn't you. You will invite them to your parents house - John will do his part and you will do yours. You will spend the ride up there convincing him to forgive her if even for the baby's sake. He will buy it. You will huddle in the kitchen with everyone else and allow him the privacy he needs. You will drug the tea - everyone except for Billy ('I need you to keep an eye on them') and John. He is not happy but follows - you gather his coat for him and it feels like old times. 

**JOHN**

You will be momentarily taken aback to find that Sherlock drugged his own family as well as your wife. Billy will assure you that it wasn't enough to hurt the baby. He will want you to follow - you will.

**SHERLOCK**

It was a trap - had you not had a laser focus on John you might not have missed the signs. It will cost you his life and future. NO. In the blink of an eye you're pulling the gun out of his pocket as he moves his hand away to allow you access and you're gritting out angry words as you put a bullet through the mans brain. John will be safe - worth it.

**JOHN**

Sherlock _shot_ a man - it shouldn't have been surprising but it was. You will watch as he falls to his knees and tells you to give his best to Mary. This is goodbye. 

**SHERLOCK**

You will spend two weeks spent in a prison cell without so much as a phone call and too many debriefings. It will be enough to drive anyone mad. You will ask about John daily - they will tell you nothing. Mycroft will pull some strings and give you an out - one last mission overseas. You will not come out of this one alive. John must not know this. 

He will step out of a sleek black vehicle and it will hit you all at once - you're in love. You always have been. You will dance around the obvious and offer your name for his child - you want a part of you to live on and maybe it's selfish but you want him to remember you. He will refuse the name but it will make him smile. It is your parting gift. You will take his hand in yours for the last time (carefully removing a glove before you do because you want your flesh to be a poem written in his touch) and grip it tight and it's almost like a gentle tug-a-war as the handshake pulls him closer and he drags you in the other direction. It is over before it began. You kiss Mary's cheeks and board the plane as tears prick behind your eyes. You will wish you could have taken him in your arms and put every damned bit of love in you into a scorching kiss until he's breathless.

**JOHN**

After everything the two of you have been through he will walk away with a handshake and a broken confession of love - you're positive that was what he was going to say. She will wrap a hand around yours and it will feel cold and empty where his was safe and warm. You will stare at his back as he boards the plane and not budge from your spot as it takes off and takes your entire life right along with it. 

And just like that - he is back and you have a chance to change things for the better. You will not waste it. 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> this was more angsty than I'd planned but these two have been through a lot just to get to this point


End file.
